Selling beauty products is a high stakes, multi-billion dollar global business. Every lipstick, every skin cream is part of a huge effort to sell glamour, youth, and attractiveness. In Branded Beauty, author Mark Tungate chronicles the rise of the beauty business. His journey begins in ancient Egypt, where, as he puts it–beauty was an expression of divinity and perfume and powder were signifiers of status. The hallmarks of youth and beauty such as pale skin,blond hair and rosebud cheeks seem to have changed little through past centuries. Artifice was always in play but fashion determined how noticeable it could be.
The history of beauty brands in the modern era begins with names like Helena Rubenstein and Elizabeth Arden, self-made women who created a name and an image that could be marketed and sold. It has always been a shadow secret of the beauty world that it is at least as ruthless as any other business. There are more than a few comparisons of ruthlessness and perfectionism that could be made between Revlon’s Charles Revson and Steve Jobs. It seems that behind every successful beauty business is a hard-working entrepreneur as in the saga of Max Factor, an immigrant whose talent for wigmaking and theatrical cosmetics led him to Hollywood. Tungate encounters the real story of some of the most beloved brands including L’Oreal, Estée Lauder and Nivea.
The truth isn’t always pretty but it is fascinating. Beauty products often reflect the concerns and fashions of the times from the rise of daily shampooing to nutrient-heavy skincare. The study of these businesses becomes a bit of sociological analysis especially when it comes to the manipulation of skin color through whitening creams on one end of the spectrum and bronzers on the other. Modern brands tell stories about their history (such as brands founded by or collaborating with makeup artists) and about their customers creating an aura of glamour or social consciousness. In no arena is this more true than in the perfume world where celebrity ads and designer bottles make the quality of the juice itself almost incidental. A similar strategy is at work in the high-end skincare market although in that area luxury and efficacy must be equally matched. Men are not immune from the beauty world either. They are now sold a wide variety of colognes and skin treatments. The strategies maybe slightly different but the end aim, to sell more product, remains the same.
Today’s beauty world is complicated by many factors including the proliferation of beauty blogs and forums. Controlling the flow of conversation can be impossible but word of mouth, both online and off, remains the strongest way to drive attention to a product. It seems there is always a new product to talk about whether it’s a back-to-nature offering featuring an exotic extract or the latest advancement in nanotechnology.
Tungate, who has written several books on media and on luxury brands, takes a dispassionate view of all the glamour and hype. He visits many of the companies mentioned in the book but isn’t seduced by the aura of luxury. Part of what keeps the book focused are Tungate’s ‘beauty tips’ at the end of each chapter which summarize marketing strategies and other key features. What we look like, or more accurately, what we want to look like, may seem like a personal decision but it is the result of an industry’s work to masks us look in the mirror and be dissatisfied with what we see.
